Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) enables communication and resource sharing between home network devices in a digital home network. The UPnP network based on the UPnP technology is a network architecture designed to set up a Peer to Peer (P2P) network between home network devices. In a UPnP device system, the user interacts with a CP in the UPnP to control the home network devices. By invoking relevant applications, the CP reads the state and control information of each UPnP device in the home network through certain media based on the UPnP protocol, performs relevant processing to generate user interface data, and presents the user interface data to the user through graphics, texts or multimedia.
A UPnP network may include multiple CPs. The UPnP technology provides a security service which enables multiple CPs to perform security control for all UPnP devices in the network. Through the security service, different levels of access rights are configured for the CPs, thus ensuring communication security between UPnP devices in the network. In order to configure access rights for multiple CPs in the network respectively, it is necessary to obtain the ID information of each CP in the network. In the prior art, a dedicated apparatus (namely, console) is deployed in the UPnP network to obtain the ID information of each CP in the network. The access rights for all CPs are deployed in a centralized way, and therefore, access rights are configured for each CP respectively.
In the process of developing the present invention, the inventor finds that the prior art uses a dedicated apparatus (namely, console) to obtain ID information of each CP in the network and configure the access rights of each CP; and the construction of a UPnP network involves at least three types of apparatuses: console, CP, and UPnP device. The network construction in the prior art is rather complicated.